The best choice for teaching

djor88 · 02-07-2013 5:59pm #1

Hello all! Thanks for reading this!

Basically, I'm a 25 year old guy from Dublin with a BA degree in history and geography from UCD (2010). I've worked a number of jobs since graduating, mainly in sales, customer service and currently in a catering company. I'm tired of the lack of purpose in my work and I'm the type of person who wants to make a difference and help as much as I can (as lame as that may sound)

I've always had an "interest" in teaching and more recently in primary teaching. I have a great friend who went to Edinburgh to do here PGDE a number of years ago and is now working in a permanent position in Edinburgh and loves it!

I'm just back from a month backpacking and was offered a EFL teaching job in Thailand. I'm sure I could go back and find a job teaching English quite easily, but I'm trying to decide on what the best option is.

1. Save up and go back to Thailand and teach english for a few months, gaining experience and seeing if i like teaching.

2. Save up, apply for the PGDE this October and make the move if I get the course in Scotland.

I'm wondering what my chances of getting the PGDE course in primary would be first time round. I'm 25, male, good leaving cert, BA degree at 2.1 grade level. I've worked alot of different jobs, done some travelling. I volunteered as a Reserve Soldier for five years and currently serve as a Reserve Garda in my spare time. I did some voluntary tutoring for Junior Cert students back in 2009 in UCD.

If anyone has any opinions/advice/information on this I would really appreciate any insights you may have.

Much appreciated,

Dave!

ytareh · 02-07-2013 6:49pm

Thailand!(teacher with 20 years behind them)

Crazyteacher · 02-07-2013 7:20pm

Have a look on the PAC.ie website and see how many points your 2.1 will get you. Then follow the instructions . I'm going to be honest and tell you that History and Geography jobs are hard to come by. But if its what you want to do , go for it. Don't forget gttr.ac.uk for UK courses. Easier to get in to and much more choice. Good luck !

djor88 · 02-07-2013 7:50pm

Thanks for the responses so far! Appreciate it!

Crazyteacher; yeah it's the UK I'd be looking at going to and my preference would be primary teaching, I've been told that there's a slight lack of male primary teachers in the UK (Scotland) so that might stand to me too

linguist · 02-07-2013 8:27pm

Dave, you sound as if you've thought this thing well through. Well done on all the civic minded things you've already done in terms of the Defence Forces, Garda Reserve and tutoring the Junior Certs in UCD. That's a lot more than the average citizen or indeed would be teacher.

Let me go back over some of the things you've said: you are tired of the lack of purpose in your work and are weighing up either doing TEFL in Thailand or cracking on with the PGDE. To be honest, if you really are as enthusiastic for this as you come across, why delay any more?

It's interesting because I was 25 when I did my HDip, I had done some stuff before (TEFL/grinds) and I had the same outlook on life as you in the sense of wanting something with real value and purpose. My friends told me that they never saw me as happy as when I was working with kids and that validated my decision. However, TEFL is very different to mainstream teaching. You would probably love Thailand but I don't think your choice would actually be much more informed than it is now. You tend to have much less in the way of discipline issues when the language gap makes it harder for the kids to talk back:)

How did the Junior Cert tutoring go? That for me would be the more relevant question.

I'm a secondary teacher myself. Crazyteacher has told you in good faith that history and geography jobs are hard to find. However, I think you'd be a great match for secondary given the stuff you've done. Notwithstanding the jobs situation, you're male, you've got great civic experience as I mentioned, you're probably reasonably athletic given the Army and Garda stuff (I'm getting at coaching teams etc) and - I'm going to have the rural mafia down on me for this one - you're from Dublin. A lot of Dublin schools would see you as the perfect role model in many ways.

However, if primary is the way you want to go, the very same issues would stand to you here at home or indeed in the UK. One small thing about training in the UK - for primary the lack of Irish would make teaching back here problematic. Check out teachingcouncil.ie to see how you'd go about making that up. For secondary, you would have to do a module on the history of Irish education for your Teaching Council registration. They give you a couple of years to do it though.

Crazyteacher · 02-07-2013 8:57pm

Sounds like Scotland is the way to go, for primary check out their requirements are in terms of Science, Maths, and English ( leaving cert and even junior science might be looked for). I've had two friends study in Scotland and haven't came home they love it so much. Best of luck. You sound really motivated

djor88 · 03-07-2013 9:01am

linguist wrote: »

Dave, you sound as if you've thought this thing well through. Well done on all the civic minded things you've already done in terms of the Defence Forces, Garda Reserve and tutoring the Junior Certs in UCD. That's a lot more than the average citizen or indeed would be teacher.

Let me go back over some of the things you've said: you are tired of the lack of purpose in your work and are weighing up either doing TEFL in Thailand or cracking on with the PGDE. To be honest, if you really are as enthusiastic for this as you come across, why delay any more?

It's interesting because I was 25 when I did my HDip, I had done some stuff before (TEFL/grinds) and I had the same outlook on life as you in the sense of wanting something with real value and purpose. My friends told me that they never saw me as happy as when I was working with kids and that validated my decision. However, TEFL is very different to mainstream teaching. You would probably love Thailand but I don't think your choice would actually be much more informed than it is now. You tend to have much less in the way of discipline issues when the language gap makes it harder for the kids to talk back:)

How did the Junior Cert tutoring go? That for me would be the more relevant question.

I'm a secondary teacher myself. Crazyteacher has told you in good faith that history and geography jobs are hard to find. However, I think you'd be a great match for secondary given the stuff you've done. Notwithstanding the jobs situation, you're male, you've got great civic experience as I mentioned, you're probably reasonably athletic given the Army and Garda stuff (I'm getting at coaching teams etc) and - I'm going to have the rural mafia down on me for this one - you're from Dublin. A lot of Dublin schools would see you as the perfect role model in many ways.

However, if primary is the way you want to go, the very same issues would stand to you here at home or indeed in the UK. One small thing about training in the UK - for primary the lack of Irish would make teaching back here problematic. Check out teachingcouncil.ie to see how you'd go about making that up. For secondary, you would have to do a module on the history of Irish education for your Teaching Council registration. They give you a couple of years to do it though.

Hello and thank you for the great replies! Very informative!

Yeah the reason for the Reserves and Garda Reserves etc was really because I was always interested in those careers, but having travelled and had some time to think on career paths, I'm more and more drawn to teaching, particularly primary teaching. I would really enjoy the challenge, the satisfaction and fulfilment and the time off during summer to volunteer and travel would really be a bonus!

The one bonus I see to going back to Thailand and try teaching english to kids is that it may stand to me when I go for the PGDE as good teaching experience? Junior Cert tutoring went well, I enjoyed it, quite hard to control one or two of the students who were pretty uninterested and lazy but I managed to work it out well, considering I was fairly young at the time too! But yeah, I enjoyed it!

Yeah I'm definitely into fitness and sport and like to keep fit, so that may help too, I'd be really interested in PE and running clubs/fitness programmes for kids. Thinking of doing a part time personal trainer course too in the near future so that could help too!

Thanks again for the replies!

Tom Dunne · 03-07-2013 10:02am

If I could give an alternative viewpoint on TEFL, I think it might help.

I am working abroad in a higher education institution, lecturing on a Bachelors programme in which we have a number of TEFL teachers.

In my experience, the majority of those TEFL teachers appear to wander from country to country every few years, with little stability and job security.

Perhaps for a year or two while seeing the world, but not as a career.

djor88 · 03-07-2013 3:10pm

Hi Tom, thanks for your input, yeah I am just back from a month travelling and met some people teaching EFL and they love it. Just surprised me as to how easy it seemed to get work in schools in Thailand. Apparently a university degree, being young and a native English speaker is enough to pick up work.

I think I'm leaning towards doing the post grad in teaching, at least then I can always take a year out if I really want to or I could travel during the summer months once qualified!

Thanks!

linguist · 03-07-2013 4:59pm

You seem to have your heart set on primary teaching and there's nothing wrong with that. However, I just feel that your talents and experience would be an excellent match with secondary. Every teacher has to judge how much about themselves they want to tell the students of course, but boys in particular would really identify with the stuff you've done and are into.

Obviously you'll hear dire stuff about the jobs situation, but let me try to put a positive spin on it as best I can. If you don't have significant commitments, particularly financial, you could probably get by for a couple of years on less than full hours. There are a lot of schools opening and going to be opening particularly in the Dublin area. People will always tell you that many of the jobs in these will be filled by redeployments but the fact remains that there will be a net increase in the number of teachers in the system each year for the foreseeable future. With your particular experience, you'd be a good match for a CSPE elective in your training and for teaching CSPE and probably SPHE as well. Again though, the point is that when you go for an interview and they're looking at the whole package you bring, you will be a strong candidate and if they want you badly enough, they'll shift things around to build up your hours as much as they can. For all of us who've been messed around from time to time, you still meet plenty of guys who get their foot in the door, carve out their niche and before you know it, they've done their four years and they're CID. I realise it's not that easy for most, but it does still happen.

All that said, I can understand why you'd want the relative security of primary. It's just that some of your skills and experience mightn't be best deployed there.

As an aside, it was interesting to read your comment about those uninterested Junior Certs. You're pretty young so the culture of the education system now is probably still what it was when you left, but the key thing is that it's a combination of discipline, encouragement, personality and humour and crucially fairness. You'll usually get the best out of boys when they fundamentally see you as a sound bloke.

The best choice for teaching

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